Apple's Steve Jobs Has Died at 56

Steve Jobs was the Henry Ford of his day: America's greatest industrialist. The business world's preeminent innovator. The chief executive every business up-and-comer wants to emulate. This evening he passed away, from pancreatic cancer, much too early at 56.

If you're reading this right now, you're almost definitely touching a device that Jobs influenced in some way.

Jobs stepped down as Apple's CEO barely more than a month ago, on August 24, handing over day-to-day duties to former COO Tim Cook as his health faltered. He got the diagnosis in 2003.

And in case you're wondering, although he kept his personal life private, Jobs was a Buddhist who spoke of death being a great motivator: "Remembering that I’ll be dead soon is the most important tool I’ve ever encountered to help me make the big choices in life,” he told Stanford graduates in a 2005 commencement address.